Comments on the Briefing from the State Council’s General Administration of Urban Construction Regarding the Exposure of Fictitious Engineers and Revisions to the Central Commentary Draft (August 12–13, 1955) Comrade Dingyi: This document [2] may be forwarded. Please ascertain under which authority the General Administration of Urban Construction falls—does it report directly to the State Council? [3] Mao Zedong August 12 Based on the manuscript copy. Two It is wrong to indulge senior intellectuals without restraint, refraining from addressing even serious problems they may have. The correct policy is as follows: resolutely protect all good people; while genuine counter-revolutionaries and other bad elements must be thoroughly exposed through mass mobilization and dealt with appropriately. [4] Printed according to Mao Zedong’s revised version.

Notes [1] Dingyi refers to Lu Dingyi, who at that time served as Minister of Propaganda of the CPC Central Committee and head of the Central Ten-Person Group. [2] Refers to the briefing dated August 10, 1955, prepared by the Office of the Central Ten-Person Group concerning the exposure of numerous fictitious engineers within the Urban Design Institute of the State Council’s General Administration of Urban Construction. The briefing stated that during the Rectification Campaign, following public denunciations and historical investigations, the institute discovered a significant number of impostors masquerading as engineers, among whom were concealed counter-revolutionaries and other undesirable elements. These individuals possessed poor technical skills and had complicated political backgrounds. They infiltrated technical departments by falsifying their records, academic credentials, and exaggerating their abilities. Some of our institutions, burdened by heavy construction tasks and urgently in need of technical personnel, indiscriminately recruited anyone claiming to hold degrees from universities or specialized colleges, thereby facilitating the entry of such fraudsters. On August 12, 1955, Lu Dingyi suggested to Mao Zedong that the aforementioned briefing be circulated. [3] “Urban Construction” Lu Dingyi reported to Mao Zedong on August 13, 1955: “The General Administration reports directly to the State Council, but its work is actually overseen by the Third Office of the State Council. The director is Comrade Wan Li.” [4] This is a passage revised by Mao Zedong in the commentary draft forwarded by the Central Committee on August 13, 1955, regarding the briefing from the Central Ten-Person Group about the exposure of fictitious engineers at the Urban Design Institute of the General Administration of Urban Construction. The text typeset in Song typeface represents words added or altered by Mao Zedong. 2£¹

Central Commentary on the Hubei Provincial Party Committee’s Report Concerning the Deployment of Agricultural Production Cooperatives (August 13, 1955)